


Fanfare, Fan Fiction, and the Fourth Wall

by madgirl



Category: Boston Legal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-21
Updated: 2008-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-25 06:44:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1637153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madgirl/pseuds/madgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alan defends a fan fiction writer sued for copyright infringement, and Denny learns about slash.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fanfare, Fan Fiction, and the Fourth Wall

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Carolyn, for Yuletide 2008.
> 
> Please take the legal analysis and depiction of courtroom proceedings with a grain of salt! Like the show, it's not quite right (but it makes better TV that way).

The front receptionist at Crane, Poole, and Schmidt typically spent all day sitting behind her desk. This was fortunate, since the red Manolo pumps that she'd worn that morning in an attempt to catch the attention of the new tax associate in the elevator were not exactly designed with walking in mind. 

And they were definitely not designed for running, which was exactly what she was doing, straight towards Alan Shore's office. Well, not running very _fast_ , that was certain, especially since the girl that she was chasing (wearing purple Sketchers, no less) was at little more than a brisk walk. 

The receptionist, unsurprisingly, was too slow. She reached Alan's door just as he was standing to greet the girl in the comfortable shoes. Standing in the doorframe, she took a deep breath and blurted, "Mr. Shore, I was under strict instructions from Shirley Schmidt not to send any new female clients under the age of twenty-five to you."

Alan, apparently unfazed, simply smiled down at the new client as he offered her his hand. "Shirley can get so jealous," he said.

"Mr. Shore--"

He looked up at the receptionist again. "Don't worry. I'll tell Shirley that I poached her right out from under you."

She looked relieved. 

"Oh, and fantastic shoes. New Manolos?"

She smiled all the way back to her desk.

#

"So." Alan leaned back against the edge of his desk as he regarded the girl. Twenty-one or twenty-two, he guessed. Still in college, judging from her clothes. Cute in a low maintenance sort of way. Dark hair tinted just red enough that it was clearly not her natural color. Glasses with black plastic frames. And she was wearing perfume that smelled faintly of black tea.

He had always credited his observation skills to years of practice girl watching. It had been exceedingly useful in issue-spotting exams in law school.

"What brings you to me?" he continued. "You must have known who you were looking for, if you were willing to give chase to the receptionist."

"I've seen you in court," the girl said.

"Oh?" He lifted an eyebrow. "Spend much time there?"

She rolled her eyes. "I'm not a criminal if that's what you're implying. I took a seminar on constitutional law when I was at Boston University. I graduated last year."

More like twenty-three then, Alan corrected. "So you're a fan of my work, then?"

"Yes," she said bluntly. "You've got balls."

"And you have a case that requires my... balls?" He cleared his throat, then added, "Though perhaps you should start with your name."

"Audrey Packard." Now that it was clear he wasn't going to dismiss her out of hand, she sat down in one of the chairs in front of his desk. "I work as a bike messenger and a freelance writer." She fished a business card out of the back pocket of her jeans and handed it to him. It had a web address and a phone number.

"You'd make more money as a waitress," he pointed out. 

"I like learning my way around the city. And I make two hundred dollars a week writing for blogs."

Alan, for his part, was simply glad that he knew what a blog _was_.

"Though if you're fishing for my financial situation I'm actually hoping that you'll find my case interesting enough to take it on pro bono." She smiled, which made her look even younger. "Or, you know, law firms can always use blogs."

"I'll keep that in mind. Why don't you tell me about your--"

Before he could finish, the door opened (not proceeded by a knock) and Denny walked in. "Hi," he said. "I heard a rumor that you snagged a cute co-ed."

Alan sighed. "Audrey, this is my... associate, Denny Crane."

"Of Crane, Poole, and Schmidt," Denny added, circling the chairs to face her. 

Audrey studied his face intently for a moment.

"Maybe you already recognize me," he said, looking pleased. "You know, I've never lost a case."

"Actually, I was just thinking that if Captain Kirk really let himself go, he'd look a lot like you," she said.

Denny swivelled his head and looked at Alan. "Captain who?"

"Audrey was just telling me about the case she has that requires my balls," Alan answered cheerfully.

Audrey leaned over and pulled a folder out of her bag, passing it to him. "I'm being sued for copyright infringement," she said.

Alan opened the folder, and scratched the back of his neck. "I'm not exactly an intellectual property expert..." He also wanted to add, I thought you said this was _interesting_.

"Did you download some music?" Denny asked helpfully. "I saw a special about that on FOX News."

"No, I didn't... well, I mean, I _have_ , but that's not what this is about. I just wrote a story."

"You mean you copied someone else's story?"

"No," she replied irritably, "I mean I wrote my own story."

Alan studied the papers for another second, then clarified, surprised, "You're being sued by a television network?"

"Yeah. They're a little annoyed that I wrote a story about _Doctor Starscape, Demon Hunter_."

"Doctor who?" Denny asked.

"No, not _Doctor Who_ , _Doctor Starscape_ ," Audrey corrected, rolling her eyes. Her eyes flicked from Denny to Alan. "Don't tell me you've never heard of it. It's only one of the most popular shows on television right now."

"I don't watch much TV," Alan said.

"I watch FOX News," Denny said. "And _Flavor of Love_."

"Well, it's just about your basic time-traveling scientist whose parents are killed by an evil overlord and is chosen to spend his life fighting evil by jumping from dimension to dimension in his spaceship killing vampires."

"That sounds kind of familiar, come to think of it," Alan said.

"I used to watch _Quantum Leap_ ," Denny offered. "I liked it when they put him in a dress."

"So you tried to sell a show concept that's the same as that one?" Alan clarified, looking through the documents again but still confused.

"No, that's what I'm trying to tell you! All I did was write a story that takes place in that show and post it on a website. That's it. My story, their characters, no money changing hands anywhere."

"No money?" Denny looked alarmed. "Well what good is it if there's no money?"

"Don't you do anything for _fun_ , Mr. Crane?"

"Yes. Shirley Schmidt-ho."

Alan cleared his throat. "So they're suing you for using their characters without permission." He looked thoughtful for a moment. "I don't suppose your story could be considered parody? There was a case a few years ago about an unauthorized sequel to _Gone with the Wind_..."

Audrey shifted in her seat. "Parody? Well... no, I doubt it. It's not exactly _deep_ , Mr. Shore. It's just a fun, stupid little story."

"What's it about? Oh, wait, here's a copy--" Alan pulled it out of the folder and scanned it. "Oh, my."

Denny looked over his shoulder. Then he looked at Audrey. Then back at the story. "Wow, she just suddenly got a lot sexier." A closer look. "Two men? Kinky. I'd heard that girls your age are into threesomes."

Audrey's face went slightly pink.

"Denny, perhaps you should take a closer look and count the number of women in this sexual scenario," Alan suggested.

Denny peered in again.

Seconds ticked past.

"Oh! Oh. _Oh_." He jerked away from the page. "So it's like, Brokeback stuff."

"It's called slash," Audrey said, sighing. "Fan fiction about two male characters in a relationship. It's really common, honestly. Here." She reached into her bag again and pulled out her laptop. She fired up a web browser.

Alan frowned. "Wait, isn't our wifi encrypted?"

"Yes, but I figured out while I was sitting in the lobby that the password is 'cranepooleschmidt.'"

Denny shrugged. "I like something easy to remember. It used to be Shirley's bra size but she made them change it."

She turned the laptop around, displaying an archive of stories, organized by fandom. "Here, see?" She started clicking through to different stories. "Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Angel and Spike reliving the decadent days when they were big bads. House, M.D. House getting over his intimacy issues by realizing that Wilson is his true love. Harry Potter. Remus and Sirius reuniting after Sirius gets out of Azkaban. Torchwood. Well, this one hardly counts since he shags everyone on the actual show anyway..."

Denny was looking through the list of fandoms, his eyes getting wider. "T.J. Hooker!" he whined. "No! He's so _manly_!"

Alan was more fascinated than anything else. "And you say there's a lot of this? People writing stories using copyrighted characters?"

Audrey nodded. " _Tons_."

"Well then why are they suing you?"

"I archive my own stories on my website, and they're pretty popular so I guess it's visible and I was easy to find... and, uh." She looked a tad sheepish. "When they sent me a cease and desist letter asking me to take down the Doctor Starscape stories, I may have written STUFF IT on the letter in lipstick and mailed it back to them."

Alan snorted. 

"So why is it called slash?" Denny suddenly asked.

"Oh, um... I think it's because of the way the pairings are usually indicated, with a back slash. You know... Kirk slash Spock, Harry slash Draco..." She smirked. "Denny slash Alan."

Denny's eyebrows shot up to his hair line. "Those sleepovers are purely platonic. There is no... slashing. Hey, do these characters know they're being slashed?"

"They're fictional characters, Denny," said Alan. "They don't know anything."

"They might suspect."

"I think that's called breaking the fourth wall."

Audrey looked back at Alan. "So they can't do this, right? Sue me?"

"Anybody can sue anybody," Denny said matter-of-factly. "It's the foundation that this country is built on."

"Actually, that's democracy, Denny," Alan said.

"Right. That's what I said."

Alan began espousing the finer points of copyright law to Audrey, neither of them noticing that Denny had taken the laptop and was pouring over the story archive.

"The best chance, of course, would be a fair use defense. We probably won't be able to show that you didn't copy the characters at all, because you did. But fair use allows for certain uses of elements of copyrighted works..." Alan looked thoughtful. "I don't suppose you could argue the story was for educational purposes?"

"What do _you_ think?"

"Right, then. The fact that it's non-commercial is helpful, but that's only one part of the analysis. A lot of people think that you can violate copyright whenever you want as long as you're not making money off of it, but actually it doesn't matter that much legally."

"Well it should," Audrey grumbled.

"We'll have to show that there wasn't any market harm, that someone wouldn't, for example, read your stories _instead_ of watching the show..."

"Heck, they should be paying me. I got tons of emails from people who came to my site for my Buffy fics and ended up reading some Starscape stuff and then getting into the show."

"Right, that will help. And I guess there's not really a question that the story is, uh, transformative of the original material..."

"No, the scientist never has sex with the son of his arch enemy on the show," Audrey confirmed.

"Good."

"Mr. Shore..." Audrey said suddenly, tilting her head to look at him closely. "Has anyone ever told you that you look like Daniel Jackson?"

"Daniel who?"

"Daniel Jackson. From Stargate. Er, not Star _scape_ , Stargate."

"Oh... really? I think I may have seen that. Actor is James somebody, right?"

Audrey shook her head. "No, I think it's Michael."

"Hey!" Denny suddenly blurted, looking up from the laptop. "Take a look at this!" 

Alan peered over his shoulder. "Who are River and Kaylee?"

"They're girls, that's what," Denny said. "There are sexy stories on here about _girls_."

"Oh yeah," Audrey said, nodding. "That's called femmeslash. Not as popular, but..."

"People want to get rid of this?" Denny shook his head. "These stories must be protected! Take her case, Alan. We're talking about the first amendment here!"

Alan sighed. "Actually, Denny, the first amendment doesn't trump copyright law."

"Freedom of speech!" Denny bellowed.

Alan turned to Audrey. "We'll file a motion to dismiss," he said. "With any luck, when the network sees that you've got a lawyer and are actually fighting it, they'll just drop it out of hand."

Audrey grinned, and leapt to her feet, throwing her arms around his neck. "I knew you'd help me!"

At that moment, Shirley Schmidt happened to walk by the office. She opened her mouth to scold Alan, obviously perturbed by the young woman hugging him, but Denny cut her off. "Don't worry, Shirley," he said. "She's not straight. She's a slasher. That means she wants two men, not just one."

Shirley opened her mouth again, then closed it, then just continued walking.

"Hey, is this a group hug?" Denny asked.

#

Alan was not exactly thrilled to be standing in court with Audrey's case. He was a bit dumbfounded by the fact that the network was actually going forward; didn't they have better things to do? 

Strangely enough, there seemed to be a lot of people there who didn't have better things to do. There was quite a crowd sitting behind them in the courtroom. Alan turned and asked Audrey quietly, "Are these friends of yours?"

"Most of the members of the Boston branch of the Doctor Starscape fan club," she answered cheerfully, and turned to wave.

"Are you sure they're not _your_ fan club?" Alan asked with a lifted eyebrow.

"Well, a lot of them do like my work."

"Ooh, kinksters, are they?" This was Denny, who had slid into second chair beside Alan. He had insisted he be there in case there wasn't proper representation for lesbian erotica readership. 

"Denny," Alan warned.

"Ladies," Denny greeted, looking behind him. He mostly got dirty looks.

The lawyers on the other side were from a local firm, and Alan hated nearly all of them. Even the pretty ones.

"They've got quite an army," Audrey whispered to Alan, sounding worried.

"They're just trying to scare you," Alan said. "Luckily, you have me. And I don't scare easily."

Still, it was an awful lot of fanfare for one little story.

"That's why I hired you."

"Right. My balls."

Their conversation was cut short because the judge walked in. Everyone stood, until he told them to be seated. He opened the file in front of him. "I see here that I have a twelve-b-six motion regarding a copyright infringement claim."

"Yes, your Honor--" Alan stood. "We would ask that you dismiss this ridiculous lawsuit. There's obviously a failure to state a claim here--"

"Ridiculous," the lawyer at the head of the other table interrupted. "Even if they're planning on making a fair use argument, that presupposes a finding of infringement. I don't see how the defense can even pretend to believe that there wasn't any substantial similarity--"

The judge held up a hand, cutting him off. "Mr. Shore, your timing seems unfortunate, given the recent ruling on the RDR Books case."

"Your Honor, the current case is nothing like the Harry Potter Lexicon. There was no dispute there that the characters were the ones from the books."

"Yes, Mr. Shore, I read the decision. Are you claiming that the characters in Miss Packard's story were _not_ the one from this... _Doctor Starscape, Demon Hunter_ television show?"

"I am claiming that they were sufficiently different to preclude a finding of actual copying."

The other lawyer jumped to his feet again. "Ridiculous."

"Yes, you already used that word," Alan said. "I'm not sure it means what you think it means."

"Your Honor, I have the story in question right here in front of me. These are copyrighted characters. Including Doctor Starscape himself!"

"A common name," Alan said. "I think I know another Doctor Starscape. A proctologist, I believe."

"Oh, please. Your Honor, he's making a mockery of--"

"We're arguing over gay alien vampire hunters. I don't think I need to do anything."

"He isn't _gay_ ," the woman sitting beside the lawyer blurted out. Alan recognized her as the television show's producer.

"Really?" Alan asked. "You're absolutely sure that the character of Doctor Starscape doesn't like the occasional man-on-man tryst?"

"Of course not!" The words left the woman's mouth about a half second before her lawyer hissed at her to be quiet.

"Enough!" The judge banged his gavel. "No one is testifying here."

"And no need, since the opposing party has just proved my point for me," Alan said. "She just said it herself. Doctor Starscape is not gay. However, the character in my client's story is. No substantial similarity. No copying."

The other lawyer snorted. "That's--"

"Ridiculous?" Alan guessed.

"Mr. Shore," the judge warned.

"Your Honor," the lawyer began. "There is considerable precedent against this kind of argument. Look at Houghton Mifflin v. Suntrust Bank..."

"What's a bank got to do with gay sex?" Denny whispered to Alan.

"That's the _Gone with the Wind_ case. Be quiet."

"Before the finding of fair use, the court held that the new book was infringing upon the original copyright," the lawyer continued. "That includes the characters. In the new version, the character of Ashley Wilkes was gay. In the original, he obviously was not."

"Are you sure?" Alan asked. "Because I've seen the movie--"

"The estate of Margaret Mitchell specifically refuses to license sequels that include any reference to homosexuality!"

"Ms. Mitchell is not in the courtroom today to clarify the sexual orientation of her characters. Your client is."

"I've heard enough," the judge sighed, shuffling the papers in front of him. "I'm very familiar with the law in this area. And I should point out that what I am about to say could very well result in an appeal. However, I do not consider it grounds for recusing myself. Therefore, I'm going to rule anyway."

Alan and his opposing counsel cast each other worried looks across the courtroom. 

"About thirty-five years ago," the judge continued, "I was the editor of a _Star Trek_ fanzine. Though I did not write those sorts of stories myself, my wife was rather fond of exploring the relationship between Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock. We weren't hurting anyone, and in fact, it was the devotion of the fans that led to the _Star Trek_ series being continued in motion pictures and spin-offs. Otherwise it would have been lost in time, just another old series, like... oh, _T.J. Hooker_. Also, I never had the fortune of asking Mr. Roddenberry point blank if Captain Kirk may have been bisexual. Therefore, I find that the plaintiff has failed to state a claim for copyright infringement. Motion to dismiss approved." He banged his gavel.

While the other lawyers were still picking their jaws up off the floor, Alan turned to Audrey. "That... was a stroke of luck the likes of which I have never encountered. Audrey... we really shouldn't have won. This motion to dismiss was a completely shot in the dark. The judge basically just ignored the law."

"This kind of thing really only happens on television," Denny agreed.

Audrey beamed at them. "Thank you, thank you!"

The lead lawyer from the other side walked over, addressing Audrey. "My client has no immediate plans to draw this out further by appealing. However, I've been asked to relate to you that should you ever attempt to profit from these stories, we will find another judge and see this thing all the way through."

Audrey said nothing, simply scowled at him, and then gave a big thumbs-up to the crowd gathered behind her. After a moment, they all began chanting the judge's name.

Looking embarrassed, he got up from the bench. Before he turned to go back into his chambers, he shot Denny a curious glance. "Mr. Crane... has anyone ever told you that you bear an uncanny resemblance to Captain Kirk?"

#

Denny and Alan sat on the balcony that evening, smoking cigars.

"Well, that turned out all right," Alan said. "You know Audrey told me she's thinking of applying to law school now?"

"We're very inspirational," Denny said. 

"That we are."

"I hear that law school applications have gone up in Boston since we've been in the public eye."

"Really?"

"Even more so than when _Ally McBeal_ was on the air."

"Huh."

"Oh, and did I tell you? Audrey's setting up a website for us, as a sort of thank you gift."

Alan lifted an eyebrow. "A website?'

"Denny and Alan dot com or something. So we can blog."

"Do you know how to blog?"

"I was thinking maybe I'd write some stories. If I write about me and Shirley, does that count as fan fiction?"

"Only if you're fictional. Otherwise I think it counts as cyberstalking."

"Are there laws against that now?"

"Yes, Denny."

"Huh." Denny took a puff from his cigar. "I guess this Internet thing isn't going away, is it."

"No, Denny, I don't think so."

"Hey, Alan?"

"Yes?"

"Do you think someone's slashing us right now?"

Alan took a sip from his scotch. "Only if we're on television, Denny."

THE END. 

 


End file.
